Broken Transmissions
by LeonaWriter
Summary: Wallace was used to people calling at odd hours, but it's less expected - although that's not to say unwelcome - when it's his old friend Steven on the phone. It looked like neither of them been sleeping well recently...


It's one am when the phone rings, and Wallace is awake to answer it.

 _"Oh, damn. I didn't wake you up, did I? I just remembered you have another battle tomorrow, don't you…"_

Wallace breathes in, and then out, tracing a hand through his bed-messed hair as though he is perfectly fine and perfectly at ease with the world, even though he can hear the shake in Steven's own voice.

It's easier to pretend things are normal, sometimes.

"No, it's fine. I was caught up late going over old documents, myself - besides. You know you can always call if you need to."

A little white lie. The old manuscripts pertaining to the Cave of Origin had been set aside long hours ago, when the current reigning Champion had turned in for the night.

There's a beat or so of silence, then-

 _"You recall how, during the incident with the meteor, the Draconid - Zinnia - suggested that there were other worlds than our own? Such as one that might not even have Mega Evolution?"_

Wallace caught himself, having frozen, wondering where his old friend was going with this.

"Yes. Although unlike some, I wasn't present for some of those discussions. But I heard of them on good authority afterwards, yes."

A crackle of static suggested a sigh, or a sharp exhale.

 _"I wonder sometimes if perhaps those worlds leak into ours, sometimes. Subtle influences, maybe, similar to lost transmissions. Such as could even be attributed to one variation's successful attempt at what we thankfully had no need of doing."_

But Steven was neither truly anything other than a scientific man, nor was he comfortable in saying such suppositions without foundation simply because - there had to be a reason.

"In which case," Wallace said, picking his words carefully, "we would have to be careful to remember that any of these… 'faulty transmissions', as you call them, are not true to our own reality, no matter how real they might seem."

It was easy enough to slip into Gym Leader mode, or even his role as spiritual advisor to Sootopolis via being the keeper of the Cave of Origin. Treat the problem as though it were happening to someone else.

"Because even if they were real," he continued, "there would be nothing any one of us would be able to do about them, and if we, say, envisioned other versions of ourselves, they would be their problems, not ours. In which case, we would need to ground ourselves in reality."

The silence lingered after that, quiet as the dead of night that it was, until it made Wallace keenly aware of every word that he had just said. Every notion that he might have given away his own situation. And if it weren't for the lack of click or beep, he might have thought that Steven had simply hung up.

" _Thank_ you."

Wallace sighed, although not without a smile.

"Was that all?"

 _"I think so. You've been - very helpful."_

"That's good to hear."

The conversation ended not long after that, and it was several minutes after that, when Wallace realised how much calmer he was feeling for hearing Steven's voice, hearing him alive, knowing he was well, not dead in his arms.

He was reminded of his own words to Steven, and shook his head, somewhat amused at how much he had needed to take his own advice.

 _Hm. I wonder how often he's had these nightmares, if this is the first time he's brought them up?_ He thought, as he made himself tea.

 _I wonder if they're the same as mine._

He looked into the teacup as though it might have more useful answers. He couldn't help but feel grateful that the two teams that had arisen in Hoenn were the ones they knew - no matter how much trouble they had caused - and not the ones that had appeared in these unexpected and highly unwelcome visions.

He'd prefer to keep the sensation of looking upon, holding, Steven's dead body, of begging him _don't be dead, you can't be dead_ , to dreams that faded in the daylight, relegated to something hidden in nightmares that would never come true.

He could only imagine what it must be like to be _Steven_.


End file.
